Captain Harlocks Chest of Eden 2.0 (my 45 gallon tub pond)

On my patio, I have a 45 gallon tub pond on my patio. As initial... practice of sorts with ponds. As we are building a 700 gallon pond this summer.
Anyhow. I used a 45 gallon rubbermaid tub. An old fountain pump we had lying around. And a lily bulb from petco.
Its progressed and changed alot since it first started, but its no where near done. Its named after the biggest of my three goldfish.
Captain Harlock is the one eyed oranda.
Markel is his first mate, the giant ryukin.
And the last smaller Ryukin is the Unnamed Sea Wench.

Captain Harlock and Markel were the best of friends in the store. so they both came home with me.
I don't have very many pictures, but I did get a few during feeding time as a preview of sorts.
Comment and whatnot. Its pretty ugly right now so I need some advice on how to make this thing beautiful!

I'm working on some marginals and a planted waterfall... Need some new water hyacinth and duckweed as well.
I'll get a full pond shot sometime soon.
Its ugly but functional.
It's a cube of my homemade food lol.
Its how I lured them all in one spot for their beauty shots.
Normally its secured with a veggie clip but I'm not sure where I left it.

I'm using a submersible fountain pump.. It was an extra one we've had lying around for years. I don't even want to tell you what I had to so to get it clean and working again. So much mineral buildup.
I have it in a one gallon bucket surrounded by lava rocks. Serving as the filter.

Quick update...
Still ugly as all heck...
And its just got uglier.
In the past two days ALL the leaves from the water lily melted and died.
All of them. So now its just a tub with some dying floaters..
Sad looking.. The fish are all doing stunningly...
I look into the pond and see that theres around 50 leaves about to shoot for the surface..
Not sure what this lily is doing...
I still have yet to get root tabs for this thing.. Pretty sure thats why it hasnt bloomed yet.
For now its just sat in aquatic pond soil.. That heavy clay stuff... With a big old layer of MGOPS in the middle..
Seems to be doing the trick but I'm fairly certain that my lack of proper nutrients is preventing flowering.

For nutrients you could put some fertilizer tablets in the pot. Put them toward the side of the pot so the roots have to grow toward them. There are pond tablets, or you can use aquarium tablets, or even Osmocote in a gel-cap, just like for aquarium use.

Odd that the leaves gave up, but good that you see more. Did some change happen, such as temperature, or suddenly more sun?

Oh, and jobs for the other able bodied sea-fish:
Snails, Plecos: They are deck hands, in charge of swabbing the deck
Mollies, Platies: They are in charge of raising the sails (if it is a sailing ship) or maybe they are engineers (if this is a powered ship).
White Cloud Minnow: Cabin boy. (or girl)

For nutrients you could put some fertilizer tablets in the pot. Put them toward the side of the pot so the roots have to grow toward them. There are pond tablets, or you can use aquarium tablets, or even Osmocote in a gel-cap, just like for aquarium use.

Odd that the leaves gave up, but good that you see more. Did some change happen, such as temperature, or suddenly more sun?

I need to.
I need to make a trip to the local nursery, get some fertilizer tabs, and some marginals and floaters...
Its strange.. It threw out some leaves.. And all off a sudden threw out tony of giant sized leaves. So many that it covered the entire pond. With all the leaves overlapping and in piles.
They rotted away.
All at once.
And now its about to throw out a new batch of smaller leaves.. Learning its environment maybe?

Oh, and jobs for the other able bodied sea-fish:
Snails, Plecos: They are deck hands, in charge of swabbing the deck
Mollies, Platies: They are in charge of raising the sails (if it is a sailing ship) or maybe they are engineers (if this is a powered ship).
White Cloud Minnow: Cabin boy. (or girl)

Are those gold fish eating any plants? Maybe I should get one, will finally have a use for duckweed.

No... not really. They eat duckweed.
And algae.. And pond snails.. And Floater roots. But really not too many.
they don't eat anything else I've put in. But I do keep fresh veggies clipped in 24/7... They tend to eat those over the plants..
Put some frogbit out there. They havent touched it.

Got a few floaters. I have to replace them every so often because the goldfish eat the roots.
They love them.
It gets kind of expensive. I intend on getting more water lettuce, and more marginals with time.
Since its spring the price of the marginals went up to $10 a pot..
And a pot goes a long way in this pond.
I do have one pond marginal right now... I'm still debating which other ones I want...
My marginal is water forget me not's.. Pretty blue flowers with large cascading leaves.
I just got it.
The one gallon pot it comes in is too big so I split it into 3 smaller pots. Two in the front corner and one in the back.
It didnt lbeing torn apart and shoved into new smaller pots.
So alot of the growth wilted. But I do see new flowers and new sturdy growth so. Heres to hoping!
Two things I've noticed... It doesnt like being handled at all..
And it doesnt like alot of sun.

Other than that.. Heres some full shots of the tub. More marginals will eventually cover the rim of the tub, hiding the sides.
And eventually all the seeds I planted in between the bricks. will spring forth into life.
So it looks pretty crappy right now...
I also need to do something about that hose as well... Make some sort of water fall...
A planted water fall...
And in the last shot you can see two of my goldfish happily munching on the water velvet.

Wow, I cant believe no one has commented on your pics yet! I guess the pond section kinda gets skipped over. i love your tub setup! I cant believe more people dont do these, they are so fun. Is this your first one? For marginals I highly recommend Thalia dealbata. its a beautiful plant! You can do a ton of aquarium plants in these too. I grew Blyxa japonica last year.

Wow, I cant believe no one has commented on your pics yet! I guess the pond section kinda gets skipped over. i love your tub setup! I cant believe more people dont do these, they are so fun. Is this your first one? For marginals I highly recommend Thalia dealbata. its a beautiful plant! You can do a ton of aquarium plants in these too. I grew Blyxa japonica last year.

It's not a very happening place... Not too many updates lol..
This is indeed my first one. We had one that came with the place. But it was tiny and stagnant and gross. We drained it and its now a flower bed.

First serious pond sort of deal... I'm in love with them.
Seriously..
These are so much fun to do. I have to be patient though... Things need to grow.

Thanlia dealbata. That was beautiful. I just googled it. A little big for this small pond though.
I am working on a 700 gallon pond and that plant is fer sure gonna be on the list.
Or would a small pot contain it?
Right now lemon bacopa is on the list. I'm trying to make alot of the plants in and around it edible.

Updates.... I got fertilizer tabs. I hope they make a difference.

The water forget me not is adorbale and bouncing back well.
It's hates full sun. It wilts in the sun. As soon as the shade is on it though it's back up and happy and blooming.
It seems to be handling the sun better with each passing day though.

Thats about it...
I need plant suggestions... Plants that need only their roots in water. But not in soil.
I was thinking of using it as a plant factory of sorts.
My LFS loves my Windelov java ferns. So I was thinking of using it to farm store credit lol...

I had my Thalia in a basket. I divided it every year and kept the smaller portion of it and traded the bigger one into the LFS for other ponders. Mini cattails are pretty cool too, or any lilies. Moss also likes these tubs if you can get a handle on algae. Just drape it over the side and it will grow somewhat emergent.

I had my Thalia in a basket. I divided it every year and kept the smaller portion of it and traded the bigger one into the LFS for other ponders. Mini cattails are pretty cool too, or any lilies. Moss also likes these tubs if you can get a handle on algae. Just drape it over the side and it will grow somewhat emergent.

Still have yet to go buy marginals for this lol.
I saw a thalia in person the other day. Very nice plant. I especially like it in giant hedges or bunches. Makes a big impact.

I think my next aquatic purchase might be an Exquisite Teacup of the Bowl lotus or a dwarf lily. And siberian pink cups.

Not for this tub pond though. My next one.
This one.. Well the fish ate all the azolla moss. Which is expected. I intend to pick up more but my local nursery... Which I'm now going to call LN for convenience.
My water lettuce exploded in growth and now I'm pulling out handfuls every morning. Also expected. The frogbit has barely grown at all. Not expected.
The water forget me not filled in real nice and was a giant bush of green and blue. I awoke the other day to find all the leaves completely stripped. Just some bare stems. It looks terrible.
And below it was a particular type of poop I knew a recognized but couldnt quite place. It hit me all of a sudden.. Caterpillar.
I searched for it for a while before I spotted it in the pond munching away on a lily pad.
When I went to get it my goldfish saw my hand and rushed for it. The caterpillar fell in and I found out that my fish can all rush in, rip apart, and eat a whole caterpillar in around 10 seconds.
That's it for this pond.
I think I'm waiting for my LN's to get some other marginals in. They get big batches of the same 5 plants over and over and every moth or so get something interesting in. lol...
Tis a waiting game. I hope the plants can overwinter here.

Register Now

In order to be able to post messages on the The Planted Tank Forum forums, you must first register.
Please enter your desired user name, your email address and other required details in the form below.

User Name:

Password

Please enter a password for your user account. Note that passwords are case-sensitive.

Password:

Confirm Password:

Email Address

Please enter a valid email address for yourself.

Email Address:

Log-in

User Name

Remember Me?

Password

Human Verification

In order to verify that you are a human and not a spam bot, please enter the answer into the following box below based on the instructions contained in the graphic.